Core Curriculum

All Interdisciplinary Women's Health Research (IWHR) Scholars will enroll in three core courses that will give them a strong background for developing independent research careers in women's health:  Responsible Conduct of Research, Communication and Grant Writing, and a Seminar in the Principles of Women's Health Research.

This course will systematically train IWHR Scholars in both the ethical issues and regulatory requirements that guide and govern research, especially those that pertain to women's health, and will teach the principles of responsible conduct of research.  The primary goals of this course are to enable the investigator to: (a) describe the ethical principles underlying the conduct of research involving human subjects and how these principles are applied to research design and conduct; (b) describe the basic principles underlying responsible conduct and reporting of research; (c) examine regulatory requirements, which have been promulgated in response to ethical concerns about the design, conduct, and reporting of clinical research.

IWHR Scholars will learn skills for researching, writing, and presenting research data by participating in a seminar on Communication and Grant Writing.  The course will center around three rhetorical modules:  Manuscript Preparation, Grant Writing, and Oral Presentation.  IWHR Scholars will also enroll in the component of the School of Medicine Mentored Clinical Research Training Program (MCRTP) entitled "Strategies for Grant Writing."  The course will provide the trainee with skills and strategies to write a successful career development proposal and eventually an R01 equivalent.

To raise the awareness of women's health research at UC Davis and to provide a forum for IWHR Scholars and mentors to interact, a seminar in the Principles of Women's Health Research will be held.  This seminar series is designed to provide Scholars practical information on research skills to supplement the one-on-one mentoring which they receive.  The first six seminars of each academic year will be faculty mentor presentations on ongoing work in their laboratory.  The second six seminars of the academic year will be presentations by IWHR Scholars of their research.  Emphasis will be placed on presenting information on research techniques, statistical interpretation methods, and ethics, as well as the research findings

This course will focus on methods for designing experiments and addressing research questions, and using biostatistics to examine the importance of research results.  The problem-based instruction will be centered about a series of case studies that will be written to motivate and illustrate the course topics.  The course will center on three areas: an overview of research design, an introduction to basic concepts in descriptive and inferential biostatistics as they apply to the clinical and basic research study, and an introduction to the critical reading of the biomedical literature in women's health.

This course will center about two key areas: pharmaceutical clinical trials and multivariate methods for analyzing data from clinical studies. Assignments will include protocol reviews emphasizing design and analysis issues; protocols will be selected from the vast archive of protocols, especially those particular to women's health.